Chapter 09

Aradhana cinema, Baroda’s best movie theatre in those days, is bang opposite the

medical college and we medicos often put this proximity to good use. Initially, we felt special to

know that flashing an ID, even a library card, fetched us tickets for the first day, first

show on a full house. Later, we learnt that this ‘royal’ treatment was availed of by anyone

even remotely associated with the medical college just by wearing a lab-coat or flaunting

a stethoscope (!) at the ticket window. The student leaders had warned the theatre

management of such exploitation by unscrupulous elements but nothing concrete was

ever done by their staff in this regard.

Sagar, starring Rishi Kapoor and Dimple Kapadia was due to release on Friday

and Manoj suggested the second show on Saturday. Everyone readily agreed, since this

was a comeback movie for Dimple after a long break that saw turmoil in her personal

life, including separation from her once-superstar husband, Rajesh Khanna. The film

magazines were full of speculations as to whether the pair would recreate the magic of

Bobby, besides the avoidable, merciless write-ups on the leading lady’s botched-up

marriage.

Saturday evening was, as expected, a full house but procuring ten tickets was easy

because of the aforesaid reason. Priya sat two seats away from me, and earlier in the day

she had convinced me that she had not been aware of the gang’s ‘real’ plan of giving me

a midnight scare in the dissection hall. I was only too eager to believe her. And that she

had bothered to wait till I was alone after college so that she could talk to me on the

issue was proof enough of her sincerity. I couldn’t ask for more, could I?

Dimple, as expected, looked stunning in the movie but it was Kamal Hasan who

stole the show with a brilliant performance. Overall, the film was quite captivating and I

even managed a quick exchange of views on the film with Priya during the interval. She

herself appeared to be thoroughly impressed by the aristocratic Rishi Kapoor.

On Monday morning, Rekha announced that she would be celebrating her

birthday on Friday, the 15th of July and we were all invited for dinner, sharp at six, at her

home in Alkapuri. Pankaj made her frown in mock anger by asking, quite mindlessly, the

number of candles she’d be blowing off her cake.

I recalled, with great difficulty, that the last birthday party I had attended was when I was

in class five, at Ankleshwar. I recollected that most birthday parties in those days were

held in small, inexpensively decorated drawing rooms of middle-class homes in our small

town. The guest list consisted of a handful of neighborhood children who showed up

before time, holding neatly wrapped gifts. Everyone wore quaint paper masks and dunce

caps and mischievously pricked at the balloons, much to the host’s annoyance, even

before the ‘cake cutting ceremony’. The main item on every birthday menu used to be the

very staple chhole-puri, and the only reason why no one left the party as soon as they

emptied their plates was their innocuous greed for the return-gift that was distributed only

at the time of dispersal.

I am not sure why we stopped attending or organizing any more birthday parties

beyond that age. Maybe the middleclass households in our immediate acquaintance were

far too indifferent to such extravaganza, with the more essential tasks like raising a

family and educating children keeping them overly occupied through the year. Birthday

parties were restricted to the younger children, whose arrival in this world still warranted

celebrations.

Meanwhile, another worry occupied my mind - the first anatomy viva that was

now only two weeks away. The course included anatomy of the brachial plexus, the

shoulder girdle and the arm. A separate five-minute session was scheduled for questions

on bones. It seemed tough and I was afraid even to start preparing, for the fear of

revealing to myself the extent of my ignorance on the topic. While Sunil preferred the

library for studying, Achal and I were more comfortable in the confines of our room even

if that meant dozing off on the bed, at times, with open books. Our preparation for the

viva, with real bones scattered all over our room (we shared a set of bones between the

three of us), made us look like tantriks. Seeing us deftly handling parts of human skeleton

shocked the unwary visitor.

‘Kamlesh Mehta, Advocate’, read the brass letters on a black granite plaque at the

main gate of the modest house in a posh area of Alkapuri. Right below the plaque, placed

quite amusingly, was a hand-painted sign that read ‘Beware of the dog.’ I smiled to

myself. It wasn’t at all difficult for me to find either Sampat Rao colony, or even

Advocate Mehta’s house. The family appeared to be well known in this part of the city. I

parked my bicycle next to a white Premier Padmini and noticed Sunil’s moped parked a

little ahead, among several other cars and bikes. Achal and Sunil had shared the latter’s

moped as the former’s had a flat tyre. It was six-thirty and I hoped I wasn’t too late. The

number of cars and bikes lined up outside the house suggested that a fair crowd had

already gathered inside. The house, though looking spotlessly neat and clean from the

outside, probably because of a fresh coat of a premium quality exterior emulsion, could

have easily been 25 to 30 years old or even more. Unlike the newer buildings, a lot of

wood seemed to have gone into the construction, which gave it a vintage look. I garnered

strength and lifted the heavy latch on the large, wrought-iron gate and closed it gently

behind me as I entered the lavish premises. Plush lawns on either side of the driveway

had littered into them, in breathtaking symmetry, quaint flowerbeds with roses in full

bloom. A huge metallic swing, an essential piece of furniture in every Gujarati family,

painted bright white, lay in one corner of the lawn. Mulberry bush lined the fence all

around and Asopalav trees, four on each side, almost abutting the bushy fence, gave a

fitting finish to the serene ambience. Barring a few telltale signs of recent renovations,

the bungalow looked flawless. I must confess here that I had never ever been inside such

a house before. And nothing in the simple, studious Rekha, had hitherto given away her

family’s status. As I approached the main door, a large, artfully sculpted teak one, I heard

loud, happy voices from within. Music blared, probably from a high output system

because I could clearly hear ‘Daddy cool’ even through closed doors. I got unnerved a bit

as I was never a guy for crowded locales and felt particularly uneasy with complete

strangers in my immediate vicinity. And I had never been in company of stinking rich

strangers. I didn’t know how to flash a smile at anyone and everyone and say how do you

do. I suddenly wished I hadn’t been invited for this party. I carried with me a polythene

bag that contained a Parker pen-set, neatly gift-wrapped in floral paper. A pen-set as a

gift for birthdays was as common as people with noses but I couldn’t think of anything

else suitable for Rekha and er. . my pocket. I took a few moments to decide whether or

not to carry the gift along with the polythene bag, before stuffing the empty piece of

plastic in my trouser pocket for a quick disposal in a dustbin, once inside. My decision

was facilitated by the fact that the bag revealed, quite prominently, the name of the gift

shop from where I had acquired it. There was a large mat by the door and I rubbed the

soles of my shoes on it to discard the dirt from them. A thin film of dust covered my

shoes and I immediately longed for a shoe-brush. Then, noticing some pairs of footwear

outside the door, I happily got rid of my own. I rang the doorbell once, which, I assume,

got lost in the din inside. I repeated the effort, this time twice in quick succession and the

noise diminished a bit before a young girl opened the door.

“Who’s it?” I heard Rekha’s voice from somewhere in the crowd as curious guests craned

their necks to look at me. I tried to ignore the stares and entered the spacious hall hoping

frantically to locate a familiar face in the sea of seated and standing people. I saw Pankaj

waving to me and relieved, I dashed towards him, keeping my gaze fixed on the floor. I

managed to avert colliding with Rekha, who suddenly appeared in my way, smiling

broadly, exposing her freshly flossed teeth. I could hardly recognize a fully decked-up

Rekha, and I must say she looked good, forcing me to wonder what make-up could do to

women. She wore an expensive but gaudy dress, perhaps fit for the occasion, and pencil-heeled

matching belles. With a twinkle in her eyes, she chirped, “Welcome, Ajay!” I

smiled in response and although I had greeted her, as everyone else had, at the college in

the morning, I said, “Happy birthday, Rekha” before handing over the gift to her. She

accepted it and said, “Thanks, I hope it wasn’t too difficult for you to locate my house. I

was angry with Sunil and Achal for not bringing you along with them.”

“No, its ok,” I said, “There was no problem finding your house,” and added with a swift

glance about the room, “Nice place you got here.”

She thanked me for the compliment and led me to be introduced to her parents and sister

who were cordial enough to say a few polite words before indicating to their daughter to

lead me to my seat. Rekha’s parents must have been nearing fifty but appeared quite fit to

me. While her mom had carefully dyed her hair black, her dad was probably too busy and

couldn’t care less for cosmetics.

It was only after I sat down that I noticed the richly furnished hall. There were several

sets of plush sofa and a large show-case that held a television set, a VCR, and a music

system that presently played traditional Gujarati music, apart from several other pieces of

expensive decorative items. Numerous photo frames encased black-white and colored

photographs. One monochrome photograph showed a little girl, probably a very young

Rekha, or perhaps, a sibling, holding a school trophy. Others showed her parents in their

younger days. The room floor was made up of large, expansive slabs of milky-white

marble, probably laboriously acquired from hard-to-reach parts of rural Rajasthan. The

walls were tastefully painted in shades of cream and the false ceiling was nicely done

with Plaster of Paris. A huge chandelier that hung from the ceiling looked elegant. Light

of appropriate intensity emanated from sources that were cleverly concealed in the

crevices of the false ceiling. There were people everywhere and with great difficulty I

could trace some of my classmates, who mingled gleefully with the crowd. Everyone

seemed to be dressed in fine clothes for the occasion and even my roomies, I realized for

the first time, wore well-ironed clothes that I’d never seen them wearing before. Even

their shoes seemed new. Did people keep away separate sets of clothes for such

occasions? I was wearing one of the four sets of clothes I owned and wore to college, and

everywhere else. It is good that the Gujarati people have this custom of removing

footwear outside their homes; otherwise I’d have been embarrassed of my age-old,

cracked moccasins, too. I was lucky that Pankaj was an introvert, like me, otherwise I’d

have been left all to myself. We talked for a few minutes and politely accepted glasses of

soft drinks served by servants in large trays. I was about to start feeling bored when I saw

Priya. She stood with a group of people unknown to me, dressed daintily in pink chiffon.

She wore light make-up, including a flesh colored lip-gloss and an eyeliner. She had kept

open her freshly conditioned, silky hair, stray strands of which gently floated high with

the fan breeze, despite the owner’s insincere efforts to keep the wayward locks in their

place. To sum it up, she looked gorgeous. Immediately excusing myself from Pankaj, I slowly

walked towards her. I should have been mortified by the contrast in our grooming but

Priya’s sheer magnetism drew me uninhibitedly towards her. I tried to attract her

attention away from the group, which had several tall and handsome boys. They seemed

to be chatting away to glory and I did not want to interrupt obscenely. I stood

uncomfortably a few feet away from them, hoping that she’d look my way soon. I was

about to give up when she saw me and smiled. I waited for her to break away from the

group and come to me but with restrained gestures, she appeared to ask me to join her. I

hesitated for a moment before deciding to take the plunge. As I approached the group,

Priya introduced me to each one of them. They were three boys and two girls, apart from

Priya herself. Stylishly dressed, each of them was a son or a daughter of a finely placed

family in Baroda and was either studying at an IIT or a BITS or an NIFD. The boys were

a good three to five inches taller than me but the worst part was that I had to literally lift

my heels to match the girls’ stature as well Topics for discussion ran out almost immediately

after the introductions and I wondered if I could start a discussion on the weather. I said a

quick nice-meeting-you to them and excused myself. I suddenly longed for my dear

friends- my dear roomies. At precisely that moment, the cake cutting ceremony was

announced and everyone gathered around the table. I managed to find a spot on the periphery of

the crowd and hoisted myself, more to try and count the candles than look at the cake

itself. I stayed put when I failed to propel myself enough. The crowd went silent for a

moment but followed it with a sudden, joyful applause and spontaneous ‘Happy birthday

to you…’ in an asynchronous chorus. The cake had been cut. Someone jumped up and

pricked a huge balloon that burst with a loud pop, showering a large amount of confetti

on the thrilled guests. Suddenly, everything seemed hopelessly juvenile to me.